JUDGMENT

Piggott, Lindsay and Sulaiman, JJ. - In this case Sardara, Bansi and Pokha, described as pasis by caste, residents of the same village, mauza Meoli, in the Rampur State, were put on their trial on a charge framed u/s 396 of the Indian Penal Code in respect of a dacoity committed on the 27th of June, 1922, at a village called Majhaula, in the Bahjoi police circle of the Moradabad district. The learned Sessions Judge has convicted all three accused and the record is before us for confirmation of the sentence of death passed by the sessions court. The accused have submitted petitions of appeal and the case has been argued by counsel on their behalf. The commission of a serious dacoity on the date and at the place specified in the charge is proved by abundant evidence and is not contested. The villagers seem to have expected succour from a fort belonging to a local Eaja and as the dacoits who were somewhere about thirty in number, were leaving the house which they had plundered, they found it necessary to fire on the assembled villagers in order to clear a passage for themselves. The evidence is that either two, or three, shots were fired, that two villagers were killed on the